PHROOGAL’S ROAD TO FINANCIAL WELLNESS TOUR APPROACHES FINAL DESINATION ON CAMPAIGN TO EDUCATE MILLENNIALS HOW TO MANAGE THEIR MONEY MOST EFFECTIVELY

Phroogal’s 30 Cities in 30 Days Campaign To Break The Taboo About Money Will Make Stops In 7 More Cities

(Elizabeth, NJ)- Phroogal, a financial education service that empowers millennials to make better informed financial decisions, is on the final leg of their Road to Financial Wellness tour. The Road to Financial Wellness Tour zigzagged across the country this month, making stops at 30 cities in 30 days to get millennials talking about their financial wellness. The tour kicked off June 1 in Portland, ME and will wrap up in Los Angeles, CA on June 30. By the end of the month, the Phroogal team will have travelled 10,000 miles on their epic cross country road trip.

The team has made a pit stop in a different American city every day since June 1, spending the day speaking with local residents and millennials about their financial stories and participating in localized events such as financial education workshops, fairs, coffeehouse discussions and impromptu street level discussions. Phroogal has teamed up with credit unions, nonprofits, financial institutions and government organizations to help make navigating financial health accessible to young adults.

“Throughout this trip, we have witnessed remarkable conversations and honest dialogue about financial wellbeing,” says Jason Vitug, CEO and founder of Phroogal. “We have had great success in teaming up with various organizations in helping to tie financial education to achieving lifestyle goals and making smart financial decisions.”

Sponsored nationally by Payoff.com, The Road to Financial Wellness events are aimed to start local conversations about money and turn them into a national conversation about financial well-being. The events vary from one location to another but each include discussion about money mindsets. As the tour winds up, attendees will talk about their relationship with money and learn about the resources and tools that empower their communities to make better financial decisions. The events will include an hour or longer session where the Phroogal team can engage, discuss and present information to the attendees.

Phroogal will be making stops in the following cities for the remainder of the Road to Financial Wellness:

·         June 24: Missoula, MT

·         June 25: Seattle, WA

·         June 26: Portland, OR

·         June 27: Berkeley, CA

·         June 28: Mountain View, CA

·         June 29: San Francisco, CA

·         June 30: Los Angeles, CA

Be sure to follow Phroogal and the events hashtag #TheRoad on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Snapchat.

ABOUT PHROOGAL

Phroogal is a millennial lifestyle brand that understands knowledge empowers people to make better informed financial decisions. Phroogal provides bite-sized information and access to relevant and reliable resources and tools in the format that millennials understand. Phroogal is based in Elizabeth, NJ and was founded in 2013 by Jason Vitug, a millennial and entrepreneur whose vision is to democratize knowledge to empower his generation to live their dream lifestyle.

NFL HALL OF FAMERS GET ALL-STAR TECH DEMO IN “STARTUP NATION”

New England Patriot's Owner Robert Kraft Brings Delegation of 19 NFL Hall of Famers to Meet with Ten Leading Startups in Jerusalem with Mayor Nir Barkat

OurCrowd, equity crowdfunding platform and investor in Israeli startups, together with Jnext – the Jerusalem Development Authority program supporting and promoting tech-entrepreneurship in the city, hosted 19 members of the U.S. Pro Football Hall of Fame for an exhibit of the latest technologies coming out of the “Startup Nation.”

The goodwill trip to Israel, coined "Touchdown in Israel: Mission of Excellence,” was organized by New England Patriots Chairman and CEO Robert Kraft, in coordination with Israel's Ambassador  to the United States, Ron Dermer. The week-long visit kicked off with the technology expo in Jerusalem’s Old City. Members of the delegation received an up close look at the best of Israeli high-tech innovation via ten hand-picked companies, seven of which are funded on the OurCrowd equity crowdfunding platform.

"Jerusalem was recently voted by Time Magazine as one of the world's five emerging tech hubs and that can truly be seen today,” said Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat. "I think it's a combination of really understanding our past and the beauty and the power of Jerusalem and its history. I believe in a very strong connection between our past and our future. More and more high tech entrepreneurs see their future here."

Patriots owner Kraft said the visit was transformative for the entire delegation. "I don't think there's a better place that you can bring people no matter what their faith might be. They come here and their lives are changed,” he said.

The NFL legends were greeted with a demo of ReWalk, a wearable bionic skeleton that allows individuals with spinal cord injuries to walk again.

OurCrowd CEO Jon Medved introduced the football greats to a demonstration of OurCrowd portfolio company Elminda, the world’s first FDA-approved neural functional assessment tool to visualize serious brain trauma and illness. Elminda was recently named one of the 50 most innovative companies in the world by Fast Company.

“Elminda is a perfect example of the kind of breakthrough technology coming out of Israel which is close to the hearts of these football greats. It offers a potentially huge breakthrough for mitigating sports injuries, detecting sports based concussions, advancing brain research and changing the lives of the two billion people worldwide living with brain disorders," said Medved.

“Through crowdfunding, the investment world is being democratized and individual investors can now get a stake in Israeli technology meaning they have a stake in Israel,” said Ron Dermer, the Israeli Ambassador to the U.S. 

Other companies on display included OrCam, an intuitive portable device with a smart camera designed to assist the visually impaired; Glide, the world’s first and only messaging application with streaming video technology; Inpris, technology that recognizes the individual movements of each fingertip anywhere on a touch-screen; MUV Interactive, a state-of-the-art solution for interacting with multiple screens and media sources through touch, remote and voice interaction; BriefCam, the video analysis software keeping our city streets safe; Consumer Physics, makers of SCiO, an advanced optical spectrometer that allows users to identify the chemical makeup of anything around them; Cimagine, the most visually advanced and user-friendly way for consumers to envision and interact with physical products in virtual reality and Highcon, which manufactures the Euclid, a machine that automates packaging production by bringing it into the digital age.

The response of the players to the technology on display was powerful and immediate.

“I think the exoskeleton’s ability to help a paraplegic walk is such an emotional thing to see," said NFL Hall of Famer David Baker. "[We were interested in] every one of these companies, from helping the consumers to helping blind people read, to helping process information better. For a lot of our players, [we appreciated] the ability to understand what’s happening in the brain with a concussion. It was all fantastic.”

“It's been very, very great and exceeded my expectations to a great extent," said NFL Hall of Famer, Curly Culp. "I'm just so glad to be here and learn about the history of Israel and how things are moving forward. I think the hospitality, the people, the history of this place, the holiness of this place you know it's a very spiritual and educational experience for me.”

About OurCrowd: OurCrowd is an equity crowdfunding platform for accredited investors to invest in Israeli and global companies. Managed by a team of seasoned investment professionals and led by serial entrepreneur Jon Medved, OurCrowd vets and selects opportunities, invests its own capital and brings startups to its accredited membership. OurCrowd investors must meet stringent accreditation criteria and invest a minimum of $10,000 per deal of their choice. OurCrowd provides post-investment support to its portfolio companies, assigning industry experts as mentors and taking board seats.  OurCrowd has raised over $130M in equity crowdfunding for its 70 portfolio companies, which include leading companies, such as: Borro, BillGuard, Consumer Physics (SCiO), BioCatch, Abe’s Market, and ReWalk, OurCrowd’s first portfolio company to complete a successful IPO on the NASDAQ

Azimo Raises $20 Mil to Fuel Global Growth

Azimo, the London based digital money transfer service, recently announced that it has raised an additional $20 million in financing. The funding will advance Azimo’s mission to be the world’s leading low-cost, mobile and social money transfer service.

Azimo s Series B funding round was led by Frog Capital, with participation from MCI Investments and existing investors*, including e.ventures and Greycroft Partners, among others.

Azimo is a provider of online and smartphone-based money transfers – providing a fast, secure and low-cost alternative to legacy high street remittance services. Founded in 2012, the company has built the most comprehensive network of any digital player, sending money to over 200 countries, reaching 5 billion people with over 80 different currencies**.

Azimo’s five-fold increase in money transfers in the last year reflects the on-going disruption of the $600 billion global remittance market. Digital and social network usage is helping workers send money home directly; saving money and time. Azimo’s announcement coincides with the International Day of Family Remittances, which aims to raise awareness of the importance of migrants transferring money home towards global development and local communities around the world***.

The company will use this latest financing to continue its pan-European growth and to target new markets in North America and Asia. Azimo's management team has unrivalled depth and knowledge of the sector having founded Small World Financial Services in 2005, and building it into Europe's leading independent, traditional money transfer company.

Azimo founder and CEO, Michael Kent said: “It’s fantastic to be announcing our latest round of funding on the inaugural International Day of Family Remittances, which recognises the huge contribution made by migrant workers to their families and communities back home.

“Azimo is just getting started on its mission to change the sector but already we serve hundreds of thousands of customers and have built the most comprehensive global network of any digital money transfer business. These funds will allow us to further expand our services and continue to give the worlds migrants a better deal.”

Frog Capital’s Iyad Omari said: “Global money transfer is a half-trillion dollar market which is rapidly going online, with customers seeing the benefits in speed, cost and convenience. The emergence of native mobile options like Azimo will only intensify this trend.”

“We’ve been impressed by Azimo’s growth in the sector and the significant traction they’ve made to date. Digging deeper, we like the retention and advocacy among their customer base. We’re delighted to partner with Azimo’s team as they look to drive this transition of the valuable and growing remittance market.”

Azimo’s advisors on this funding round were FT Partners and Dorsey and Whitney.

 

 

 

 

Michelle Flandreau is New Vice President Of Marketing at Guidant Financial

Bellevue's Guidant Financial Names Michelle Flandreau VP Marketing

Bellevue-based small business financing specialist Guidant Financial has hired Michelle Flandreau as vice president of marketing. Based in Guidant's Bellevue headquarters,  Michelle Flandreau's hiring is in Guidant's 12th year in business.  Guidant Financial's state goal is to put $350 million to work for small business in 2015.  Reaching this goal will help empower entrepreneurs to help realize their dreams of business ownership. Michelle Flandreau will drive marketing and communications for Guidant and lead the strategic direction of the company.  She will also oversee earned and social media, email marketing and advertising and hopefully be working to renew a former partnership with Bellevue Business Journal.

For more than 15 years, Michelle Flandreau has developed and managed integrated, results-driven marketing campaigns. She joins the Guidant Financial team with a passion for customer service, entrepreneurship, and building a vibrant company culture.

Prior to Guidant, Michelle worked for top retail and consumer technology companies including Tommy Bahama, Expedia, and Nordstrom. Most recently, Michelle helped double sales and grow the marketing team at LiquidPlanner, a Seattle software startup.

"Michelle is an experienced strategist who excels in integrated marketing programs and brand management," said David Nilssen, CEO and co-founder of Guidant Financial. "She's joining us at an exciting time of company growth and will have a profound impact leading the strategic marketing direction of our brand."

Flandreau is a graduate of Western Washington University.

About Guidant Financial
Guidant Financial works with entrepreneurs to identify, evaluate and deploy intelligent business financing strategies. Their services include, but are not limited to, rollovers as business startups (ROBS), SBA loans, unsecured credit and portfolio loans. Since 2003, Guidant has helped deploy more than $3 billion of capital into 10,000 small businesses and franchises.  Guidant Financial was a long time advertiser with Bellevue Business Journal when we still printed a newspaper - and before print was officially declared dead.

PicsArt Mobile Creative Image Community Raises $15M Led By Insight Venture Partners and Sequoia Capital

PicsArt Mobile Creative Image Community Scores $15 Million in New Funding

PicsArt mobile creative image community today announced $15M in new funding from Insight Venture Partners and Sequoia Capital. The new round follows a previous investment of $10M from Sequoia earlier this year. The new funding will enable the company to expand globally and develop new tools for users.

PicsArt mobile creative image community is for amateur and professional photographers, designers, artists and anyone who wants to use PicsArt’s extensive image creation and editing tools to beautify their world. PicsArt’s further enabled community collaboration with its latest feature update. Now #freetoedit images from PicsArt mobile creative image community can be shared on Facebook, inviting a new community to use PicsArt’s desktop-grade tools to edit their images.

Users can also share their creative process with others through automatically generated timelapse videos. Hit a button when you start working on an image and when you are done, share a video showcasing your technique so other users can learn from you. These are just the latest tools empowering PicsArt’s community of more than 65 million monthly active users that co-creates more than 250 million images per month.

“We want to continuously provide artists with the means to connect and collaborate,” said PicsArt CEO and founder, Hovhannes Avoyan. “With this round of funding, we can continue to do so with app updates that boost collaboration settings, such as video generation, increased sharing and the latest photo-enhancing tricks.”

“PicsArt’s rapid growth is a true testament to its unique creative platform,” said Jeff Horing, managing director at Insight Venture Partners. “We are pleased to partner with the PicsArt team as they continue to set themselves apart by solidifying a community of collaboration.”

Anyone with a smartphone can download the PicsArt Mobile Creative Image Community app from the App Store, Google Play, Amazon or Windows. To learn more, go to www.PicsArt.com.

About PicsArt
PicsArt Mobile Creative Image Community is the largest mobile community of creatives and creative images. The company’s U.S. office is based in San Francisco, California with a focus on enabling anyone to be creative, share, socialize, discover, learn and be inspired. The app has been installed over 230 million times and continues to expand and improve, so anyone can unleash their creativity and discover their inner artist.

About Insight Venture Partners
Insight Venture Partners is a global private equity and venture capital firm founded in 1995. They also invested heavily in Bellevue-based SmartSheet. They have raised more than $10 billion and invested in more than 200+ growth-stage software, internet, and data-services companies. Our Investment Team meets with thousands of companies each year, selecting a handful to invest in, supporting them with market insights and exposure to potential acquisitions and acquirers. Our Insight Onsite team provides hands-on resources and collaborative expertise to help companies scale.

About Sequoia Capital
The Sequoia team helps a small number of daring founders build legendary companies. We spur them to push the boundaries of what’s possible. In partnering with Sequoia, companies benefit from our unmatched community and the lessons we’ve learned over 40 years working with Steve Jobs, Larry Ellison, John Morgridge, Jerry Yang, Elon Musk, Larry Page, Jan Koum, Brian Chesky, Drew Houston, Adi Tatarko and Jack Dorsey, among many others. In aggregate, Sequoia-backed companies account for more than 20% of NASDAQ’s total value. We’re proud that their success also fuels great causes: since 2000 alone we have returned more than $10 billion to non-profits like the Ford Foundation, Mayo Clinic and MIT.

Free Download for BBJ Subscribers: "Understanding the Myths of Market Trends and Patterns"

For a limited time, BellevueBusinessJournal.com subscribers can now download the free ebook from Forex Trends called Understanding the Myths of Market Trends and Patterns.

Click on the link to download your copy of this extremely valuable information on how to actually make money in Forex trading.

For those of you unfamiliar with Forex, or uncertain what Forex is, here is the entry for Forex at Wikipedia:

Foreign exchange market

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

"Forex" redirects here. For the football club, see FC Forex Brașov. For the U.S. FBI sting operation, see Dominic Brooklier § Bompensiero murder.

Foreign exchange
Exchange rates
Currency band Exchange rate Exchange-rate regime Exchange-rate flexibility Dollarization Fixed exchange rate Floating exchange rate Linked exchange rate Managed float regime
Markets
Foreign exchange market Futures exchange Retail foreign exchange
Assets
Currency Currency future Currency forward Non-deliverable forward Foreign exchange swap Currency swap Foreign-exchange option
Historical agreements
Bretton Woods Conference Smithsonian Agreement Plaza Accord Louvre Accord
See also
Bureau de change Hard currency Currency pair
v t e

The foreign exchange market (forex, FX, or currency market) is a global decentralized market for the trading of currencies. In terms of volume of trading, it is by far the largest market in the world.^[1] The main participants in this market are the larger international banks. Financial centres around the world function as anchors of trading between a wide range of multiple types of buyers and sellers around the clock, with the exception of weekends. The foreign exchange market determines the relative values of different currencies.^[2]

The foreign exchange market works through financial institutions, and it operates on several levels. Behind the scenes banks turn to a smaller number of financial firms known as “dealers,” who are actively involved in large quantities of foreign exchange trading. Most foreign exchange dealers are banks, so this behind-the-scenes market is sometimes called the “interbank market”, although a few insurance companies and other kinds of financial firms are involved. Trades between foreign exchange dealers can be very large, involving hundreds of millions of dollars. Because of the sovereignty issue when involving two currencies, forex has little (if any) supervisory entity regulating its actions.

The foreign exchange market assists international trade and investments by enabling currency conversion. For example, it permits a business in the United States to import goods from the European Union member states, especially Eurozone members, and pay Euros, even though its income is in United States dollars. It also supports direct speculation and evaluation relative to the value of currencies, and the carry trade, speculation based on the interest rate differential between two currencies.^[3]

In a typical foreign exchange transaction, a party purchases some quantity of one currency by paying with some quantity of another currency. The modern foreign exchange market began forming during the 1970s after three decades of government restrictions on foreign exchange transactions (the Bretton Woods system of monetary management established the rules for commercial and financial relations among the world's major industrial states after World War II), when countries gradually switched to floating exchange rates from the previous exchange rate regime, which remained fixed as per the Bretton Woods system.

The foreign exchange market is unique because of the following characteristics:

• its huge trading volume representing the largest asset class in the world leading to high liquidity;


• its geographical dispersion;


• its continuous operation: 24 hours a day except weekends, i.e., trading from 22:00 GMT on Sunday (Sydney) until 22:00 GMT Friday (New York);


• the variety of factors that affect exchange rates;


• the low margins of relative profit compared with other markets of fixed income; and


• the use of leverage to enhance profit and loss margins and with respect to account size.

As such, it has been referred to as the market closest to the ideal of perfect competition, notwithstanding currency intervention by central banks.

VITEK Mortgage Group Expands into Washington

VITEK Mortgage Group has announced their expansion into Washington. Their new team and office are located in Bellevue, WA at 10900 NE 8th Street Suite #110.  This new VITEK location will be the first of many to come in Washington, as they anticipate opening more offices in the near future.

The seasoned professionals of the new VITEK Bellevue team are aligned with our core principals of value, integrity, teamwork, excellence and knowledge.  Beyond their dedication to helping homebuyers achieve their dream of home ownership, they will be focused on truly serving the community.

VITEK President, Harry Duncan, says, “Our roots run deep in our love for Washington.  We spent a lot of time with family in the Seattle area while growing up.  Our mother was born, raised and graduated as a Huskey”.

We are excited for this time of growth and look forward to serving the Washington community.

About VITEK Mortgage Group

VITEK Mortgage Group has been in business for 27 years and is dedicated to opening doors to better lives.  They are licensed to originate loans throughout all of California and Washington and specialize in government, conventional, Jumbo, and down payment assistance home loans.  As a mortgage banker VITEK processes, underwrites and funds home loans in-house.  VITEK Mortgage Group is an Equal Housing Opportunity lender. NMLS # 37408 · Washington: Consumer Loan Company License # CL-37408. · California: Licensed by the Department of Business Oversight under the California Residential Mortgage Lending Act.

Mikayla Morgan Promoted to Marketing Integration Manager at LoanStar Home Lending

Mikayla Morgan was recently promoted to Marketing Integration Manager and Coordinator for the Marketing Department at LoanStar Home Lending.

“Mikayla has been with our core team since before LoanStar was founded and has a very intimate knowledge of how our marketing systems work best for our originators.  And now as a licensed originator herself, she brings even more experience to the team and will be a tremendous asset to new loan officers and branches that join LoanStar in the future,” said Kenn Bartley, SVP Marketing and Business Development. Mikayla has been with the company since November 12, 2013 and has held positions as Marketing Coordinator and Regional Marketing Manager.  She will continue to serve as a marketing concierge for LoanStar’s Bellevue, Vancouver, and the Walla Walla branches, supporting those loan officers with all of their marketing needs from on-boarding and beyond.

We are excited about this new position at LoanStar, the Marketing Integration Manager, will be responsible for coordinating and facilitating all marketing onboarding activities for new employees.  Kenn Bartley added, “LoanStar recognized the need for a robust onboarding process since we founded the company, and elevating Mikayla Morgan to the new position of Marketing Integration Manager is another sign of our commitment to make the transition to LoanStar seamless and smooth.”

Alan Thain Joins RPM Mortgage as Senior Loan Advisor

RPM Mortgage, Inc. is proud to welcome Alan Thain to its Bellevue office as a Senior Loan Advisor.

With more than 22 years of experience in the mortgage industry, Alan is committed to providing outstanding service and communication to his clients.  His extensive knowledge and passion for lending allow him to confidently and efficiently guide his clients through the loan process.

With access to RPM Mortgage, Inc.’s expert lending services and innovative mortgage solutions, Alan can offer his clients exceptional service and best-in-class home loan options. RPM’s “Can Do” attitude is a perfect match for Alan’s proactive approach to educating his clients and communicating with them throughout the loan process. Alan personally attends all of his closings to ensure his clients are well taken care of. Alan believes the success of his business is based upon building strong and successful relationships, and he takes great pride in helping his clients achieve their financial dreams.

Alan has been a 5-star Professional award winner for five years, and has over $400 million in career production.